Clarence Thomas Was On My Mind
by HEADoc I woke up in a bad mood this morning. I had a dream that I had finally lost my mind for good. I recall screaming and yelling and escorted from the building after talking to the bank on the phone and being told that the Attorney General had frozen my account. I then ran over a fire hydrant in a car I drove (badly) via remote control and challenged the police and an angry mob featuring an extremely obese cop with a hypodermic needle for me. I didn't care if they killed me at first then I changed my mind and decided to run for it. I outran all of them but one or two. They finally forgot why they were chasing me. The colors were vivid reds, greens, browns, and the sun came out as the water stopped coming down. The next thing I remember was awakening with the thought in my mind of I hate Clarence Thomas. How is that for crazy? I haven't been able to get that thought out of my mind. I actually began to start to like Justice Thomas for the first time after viewing some of his 60 Minutes interview last Sunday. He spoke about his new book My Grandfather's Son and how firm and proud his grandfather, a descendent of slaves, had raised him to be. He disappointed his grandfather by not following through with his initial endeavor to be a clergyman. He attended Harvard Law School later but found the degree to be of little use in helping him to prosper. He commented that the degree wasn't worth the 15 cents frame it was mounted in. He spoke of how racism affected his earlier life prior to becoming a part of the Reagan administration where he would eventually be selected by President GHW Bush to replace Thurgood Marshall on the US Supreme Court where he remains to this day. Thomas is most despised in the Black community for his controversial and hypocritical stance on Affirmative Action for minorities, claiming that it is pacifying and harmful to recipients. The irony lay in the fact that his whole life and career are the epitome of Affirmative Action. Yet he has the audacity to voice the belief that all other blacks should pick themselves up by their boot straps, regardless of background circumstances. He feeds into the erroneous belief Affirmative Action is always synonymous with quotas and giving something to unqualified or undeserving parties. He apparently buys the line that institutions will automatically end racist discriminatory practices out of the goodness of their heart. He also must accept the premise that no harm was done by the years of government supported Jim Crow. Was that not just Affirmative Action in reverse? As far as I am concerned, Justice Thomas' vote to stop the Florida ballot count in Gore v Bush in the 2000 Election was Affirmative Action in favor of our current President. Regardless of the spin, the fact remains that Republicans do not care about poor people in general. Future discrimination is more likely to be based on class rather than race. In the day of Justice Thurgood Marshall racism was the core issue. Thomas has been quite successful in reversing much of the progress Marshall fought to accomplish in the arena of racial equality. The sad part is that he probably doesn't even care. I see why he rides incognito in his RV when traveling the country during vacation time. Some who read this may criticize me as just being petty and jealous of Justice Thomas. The truth is that I would not trade beliefs and places with him for any amount of money or popularity. It does bother me, however, that he is considered to be a premiere representative of a typical successful African American who can receive instant publicity of his book throughout all the media when other voices such as Tavis Smiley, Michael Eric Dyson, or Dr. Cornell West of Princeton University seem to be suppressed by major media outlets. Why is that? My own book is not a masterpiece but is professionally edited and I believe to be more in line with how most African Americans perceive reality than anything Thomas could ever write. Is it politics or money that gives his book preferential exposure to other authors who may address comparable topics? I didn't really want to make this entry but I felt I needed to. I know there are people who agree with me. I am not attempting to spark debate or inflame any right wingers. Sometimes I just have to get things that may be bothering me out of my system so I can move on. Posted on Fri, October 5, 2007 at 08:28PM by HEADoc in Political Commentary | Post a Comment | Email | Print __NOEDITSECTION__ Category: Opinions Category: Opinions by User 74.60.166.166 Category: October 6, 2007 Category: October 2007 Category: Democratic Opinions Category: Barack Obama Opinions Category: Society Opinions Category: President Bush Opinions Category: Hillary Clinton Opinions Category: Clarence Thomas Opinions Category: Supreme Court Justice Opinions From The Opinion Wiki, a Wikia wiki. From The Opinion Wiki, a Wikia wiki.